Jan Fransaer, Omar Martinez-Mora and Xochitl Dominguez of the Department of Materials Engineering, KU Leuven, have a new US Patent Application Publication relating to a process for precipitating particles of platinum group metals. The patent application was published on May 30th, 2024.
The present invention relates to a process for recovering platinum group metals from a feed containing one or more precursor compounds of one or more platinum group metal ions, wherein the process comprises the steps of (i) supplying to a cathode compartment of an electrochemical cell equipped with a cathode comprising a gas diffusion electrode with a porous electrochemically active material, the feed containing the one or more precursor compounds to form a liquid phase in the cathode compartment, (ii) supplying a CO2 containing gas to the cathode compartment, (iii) applying a potential to the cathode which is such as to cause electrochemical reduction of the CO2 to CO, (iv) and recovering from the liquid phase precipitated particles of the one or more platinum group metals in clemental form.
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